


What's Loved

by Sineala



Category: Young Wizards - Diane Duane
Genre: Bloodplay, Community: fandom_stocking, F/M, Interspecies, Sensation Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-03
Updated: 2013-01-03
Packaged: 2017-11-23 11:48:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/621799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sineala/pseuds/Sineala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Much later, Nita meets Ed in Timeheart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What's Loved

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ambyr](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambyr/gifts).



> I have loved these books for at least fifteen years now. This was... really not what I thought my first YW fic would be, but here it is. Um. Hi.

Nita's sense of the dream was slow, hazy, filtered, in the way that dreams sometimes were. It could just as easily have been her subconscious, but it was so achingly real that she thought, scuffing the sand with her toes, that she had once again fallen into Timeheart. She had not expected it, but then, here it was. It was never what, or when, you expected it. And this time it was not the great shining city. No, it was a beach, a sandy little island, the grains warm and white under her feet, the sun bright above her, the clear water lapping just a few feet away.

She was alone, she thought, and then under the water, something moved. A huge pale shape glided past, and her heart seized up all at once. _What's loved, survives._ Still. Again.

She ran forward and dove, with a great splash, as soon as there was room for her to fit her body under the water. When she put her head under, she saw him. The shark. Still huge, bigger than anything, but there was no fear here. They were past death.

"Sprat," Ed'rashtekaresket said, lazily backfinning as she swam toward him, with that dry voice she had never forgotten, "you're smaller than I remembered."

She should be bigger, thought Nita indignantly, it had been years -- but then she remembered she had only ever been a whale, then. There was no shapechange to concern herself with now. No need for air. There were no spells to worry about here, not in this dream. Or perhaps she did them without thinking, for she found that she did not have to think about breath. The air came to her, as simply as that, and she spoke without needing to think about how she was speaking.

"I'm older now," she said, feeling oddly defensive about it. Surely Ed had to notice. Though maybe all humans looked the same to him, especially at his size.

"'Old enough to love?'" the shark quoted, sounding almost bland, turning the words of the Song into a question. "Though you always were, I suppose."

Nita grinned a little. "There's Kit, now."

"Not that, Sprat." Ed's tone was patient. "The Song doesn't care about your human romances. Nor does the Sea itself. It never did. You love him. You love your kin. Your friends. You love me, for I -- no wizard -- am here at your Heart of the Sea."

_Do I?_ she wanted to ask, but when she opened her mouth all that she could say was "Yes," with a feeling like she had when she had sworn to take the Silent One's part, that there was more here than she had agreed to, with her all unknowing.

Ed eyed her a long time, in fiery silence, and then in one graceful motion he rolled, exposing his even paler underbelly. Unprotected. It would be soft, if she touched him. Sleek. Warm as the sea.

She stretched out a hand, and when her fingers brushed against his belly, it was Nita who shivered.

"You dare much, Sprat," Ed said, and she could feel his voice creak through him, she could watch his fins quiver, just a little. It was a threat, and she went hot all over, hot and shaking, and she didn't even know what this was. What were they doing? What could they even be doing?

She let her fingers drift up along the soft flesh, almost tracing out a spell, or a name. "And you're letting me."

She wanted to-- what did she want? Her mind filled with strange pictures, things no one could do, and her skin tingled all over, where they weren't touching, where she wanted to be. She could lean up against him, smooth and hot and dangerous, and they could swim together, across the endless sea.

All at once Ed jerked back, fast, and he circled about to face her head-on, a gaping maw, all deadly teeth. "Careful," he said, but he said it like he didn't want her to be. "Sprat, I bite."

"Maybe I want you to," Nita said, and spread her arms wide, tilting her head back into the sunlight shining through the water, waiting for it, a thousand knife-sharp edges against her skin, yes--

\--and she awoke, twisted in the sheets of her bed, arms still outflung.

Her right arm throbbed and pounded, a feeling that ought to have been pain, and she looked down to find that it was streaked with blood. Just a little. Enough to count.

Ed had always kept his promises.


End file.
